Free The Fun Factory by Chris England Page A

we’re up against, eh?”
    Outside Alf was waiting for me by his motor car. I’d seen motor cars close up before, of course, even though they were still something of a rarity on the streets. Several of the more affluent and fashionable young gentlemen at college had purchased them, and very proud they were of them too.
    It was a gleaming new Ford, which, as the saying went at the time, came in any colour “so long as it’s black”. (This one was blue.)
    Reeves fiddled about with some switches or knobs inside the machine and then emerged with a starting handle, which he handed to me.
    “You do know how to use this, don’t you?”
    “I’m afraid I don’t,” I replied. His face fell.
    “Curse it all!” Reeves took the handle back from me and shoved it into a socket low down at the front of the vehicle. “I was hoping I wouldn’t have to do this. I really dislike it – it has a kick like a mule if you don’t get it just right. All right, now watch me, and then next time you’ll know what to do, won’t you?”
    Reeves cranked the starter handle round a couple of times, and then leapt out of its way as it sprang back, narrowly missing his shins. He glanced up at me, licked his lips, then approached it warily to give it another go. This time he managed to get the engine turning over, and he yanked the handle free and scuttled round to the driver’s seat.
    “In! In! In!” he cried, and I hurried round to the passenger side and climbed aboard.
    Reeves let off the handbrake, a gout of smoke guffed out of the machine’s rear end, and we rolled away from the little gaggle of gawking street children that had formed.
    It was, as I say, my first ride in a motor car, and I remember feeling quite vulnerable. Everything on the road seemed to be larger and more robust than our flimsy carriage, which felt like it was going to tip over at every turn, and Alf’s style of driving involved rather more near misses than seemed strictly necessary.
    “Freddie got you settled at Clara’s, then, did he?” he shouted, veering round a grocer’s cart.
    “Yes, Mr Reeves.”
    “Oh, I’m Alf, you can call me Alf. You mustn’t mind Freddie, you know. He’s a nice boy deep down.”
    “I’m sure he is,” I said, although it has to be said I wasn’t, not at all.
    “His father won’t let him on the stage, at any price, and so naturally that’s all he’s ever wanted, you see?”
    Before long, mercifully, we were barrelling down the Mile End Road, which was nice and wide and straight and with fewer things we could possibly smash into.
    “This is the Jewish part of town,” Alf explained, and I suppose the character of the streets did seem subtly different to those of Camberwell and Streatham. A lot more beards about the place, I think that had something to do with it.
    “You get some very good crowds round here,” Alf went on. “Do some really good business. Good sense of humour, your Jewish audience, and Jewish comedians are all the rage at the moment, you know.”
    He turned down a side road and pulled up with a jolt opposite a brightly lit building, the front of which was plastered withmusic hall bills. A queue of people snaked down the steps and along the street, chattering, in boisterous mood, waiting to be admitted to the evening’s performance.
    “This place is called Forester’s,” Alf said, pulling up on the handbrake. “One of the smaller houses, but there’s a good bill on tonight. Come on…”
    I stepped out of the motor car and headed for the end of the queue, but Alf took my arm and led me down a passage along the side of the building to the performers’ entrance. We went up some stairs and into the backstage area, where Alf guided me through the throngs of folk making themselves ready, looking for someone in particular. Everyone we passed had a greeting for him, ranging from a deferential “Evening, Mister Reeves!” to a cheery “Alf!”, until we reached the object of our quest, who hailed him with